Skip to main content
Main

Lamb, Breast Of, Rolled

A rolled lamb breast filled with veal forcemeat, browned and simmered in a stock gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Clove and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,451 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Lamb, Breast Of, Rolled

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the gravy

  1. Combine the bones from the lamb breast, onion, and stock or water in a saucepan and simmer gently to make gravy.

Roll and brown

  1. Spread the veal forcemeat on the underside of the lamb breast, roll it tightly, and secure with skewers.

  2. Melt the butter in a saucepan, add the rolled lamb breast, and brown it evenly on all sides.

  3. Once browned, strain the gravy from the bones over the lamb.

Simmer

  1. Add pepper and salt, cover, and simmer gently.

  2. Simmer until the meat is tender, about 1.5 to 2 hours.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Lamb + peppertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,165 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Onion + clovetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,901 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  5. Lamb + vealtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together568 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Lamb breast
Forms the main meat, which becomes tender through long, gentle simmering.
Veal forcemeat
Adds richness and moisture inside the roll as it cooks.
Fresh butter
Carries fat for browning the outside of the rolled meat.
Stock or water
Provides the liquid that becomes the gravy and keeps the meat moist while simmering.

The step that matters

Simmer until the meat is tender. Lamb breast is a tough, fatty cut that needs long, gentle simmering so its connective tissue breaks down. Holding the liquid at a bare simmer rather than a hard boil keeps the meat from toughening and drying out.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lamb, onion, veal, butter, pepper):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Garlicfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lamb, onion, veal, butter, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

You might also like

Veal PattiesVeal Patties50 recipesBeef, Mutton, or Veal BrothBeef, Mutton, or Veal Broth6 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipes